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Ontario’s big pitch for Amazon.com Inc.’s second home doesn’t currently include a massive tax break for the company, just the promise of highly educated potential employees whose presence will help the e-commerce giant save on labour costs.

And while Amazon will have access to various incentives the province has made available to other companies in the past — a business support system that can provide grants for those that qualify, such as the one worth up to $220 million announced in 2013 for Cisco Systems Inc. — officials say they aren’t offering anything new in wooing the online retailer’s second North American headquarters, or HQ2.

“We’re not going to buy Amazon to come here,” Ontario Economic Development Minister Brad Duguid told reporters Wednesday morning at Toronto’s Royal York hotel. “We don’t need to buy Amazon to come here, because we have the competitiveness and the best talent base anywhere in North America today.”

Duguid’s remarks followed a speech for the Canadian Club Toronto by former TD Bank Group chief executive Ed Clark, who outlined the province’s plan.

Clark serves as Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne’s business adviser, and said she asked him to steer the province’s approach to helping cities make the official bids for Amazon’s HQ2, which the company has said will include $5 billion in construction investment and up to 50,000 “high-paying” jobs.

Clark predicted Ontario would win Amazon’s sweepstakes for its second North American headquarters if politics don’t come into play. The protectionist Trump White House has no great affection for one of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ other ventures, The Washington Post newspaper.

But Ontario’s angle also stands in contrast to the bid offered by New Jersey, where Governor Chris Christie announced this week up to $7 billion in potential tax incentives over 10 years for Amazon to locate HQ2 in Newark.

“The Ontario government is not offering any new financial incentives to Amazon – nor any incentives that are not available to others who seek to grow or locate such jobs here,” Clark said.

“I think when someone gives you the ($7 billion), they’re saying ‘I’m not actually competitive, you would never come here if I didn’t give you this money,’” he told reporters later. “That is what those governments are saying, and we’re saying you should come here, because this is the right place.”

Instead, Ontario is going after Amazon’s heart by going after its labour needs. The province announced Wednesday it intends to increase the number of science, technology, engineering and math graduates in the province by 25 per cent over the next five years, to 50,000 per year from 40,000, meaning no other North American state or province would be churning out more STEM graduates per capita than Ontario, Clark said.

The province will also spend another $30 million on boosting the number of graduates steeped in artificial intelligence. These changes will take place whether Amazon comes to Ontario or not, Clark said.

Clark also said Amazon’s own figures suggest real estate is just 10 per cent of the company’s expenses, while the company faces about $5 billion per year in salary costs. He noted that if a government can offer Amazon a 30 per cent discount on those labour expenses, the savings of about $1.5 billion annually would be “staggering.”

“This talent is more competitively priced than in the United States,” he said.

Amazon outlined its preferences for HQ2 in a request for proposal document released last month, wherein the company said it is eyeing a metropolitan area with a population of more than one million for its second home. Since the company announced the contest, city after North American city has voiced interest in a bid, including Canadian ones such as Toronto, Halifax, Calgary and Vancouver.

The deadline for submitting HQ2 proposals is Thursday.

Amazon has hinted it will take a lot of generosity to win the HQ2 sweepstakes. The company’s request for proposals asked for “a summary of total incentives offered for the Project by the state/province and local community.” It also asked for “relevant crime data and cost of living data.”

“A stable and business-friendly environment and tax structure will be high-priority considerations for the Project,” the RFP said. “Incentives offered by the state/province and local communities to offset initial capital outlay and ongoing operational costs will be significant factors in the decision-making process.”

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